Earth-H
Overview Earth-H is a world of adventure and intrigue. It is a world where a thousand conspiracies run wild, interfering with each other every step of the way. Mutants and magicians secretly walk among the “normal” people. Giant alien robots disguise themselves as mundane machines, and various factions jockey for the stakes of the world. These players range from benevolent (or at the very least protective) guardians to malicious entities, along with everything in between. Advanced technology and science coexist with magic. The core concept is “the Sunbow-Hasbro cartoons from the ‘80s, but in the modern day and with characters from Marvel and Gargoyles, plus MASK and C.O.P.S.” Overall, it's a more optimistic place than the mainstream Marvel universe. Universe's present time period is early-to-mid-2010s. History Earth-H's history is relatively close to that of our reality for the most part, barring a few major points of divergence in the 19th and 20th centuries. Prehistory During the Paleolithic period, humanity shared the planet with three other players: the Mutores (generally benevolent nature spirits), Cobra-La (a civilization of reptilian humanoids from the 1987 GI Joe movie), and the Inhumanoids (a trio of eldritch abominations consisting of the demonic rock monster Metlar, the Cthulu-esque walking lichen Tendril, and the undead kaiju D'Compose). Around 6,000 BCE, the Inhumanoids were defeated and contained, and Cobra-La had pretty much been driven to extinction in their war against them. All that’s really left of them are a few thousand miles of underground warrens spanning from the Middle East to the Himalayas. The Beast Wars in 1884, two chronologically displaced factions of Transformers called the Maximals and the Predacons crashed somewhere in northern Utah. Over the next three years, the two groups fought over a series of massive deposits of energon in the region. However, said deposits were already being exploited by local human settlers, who dubbed the glowing substance "ghost rock". This led to a brief localized technological boost focused around the town of Höllenfeur. After 1887, however, the town was more or less abandoned and the "ghost rock" became little more than a footnote in a geologist's papers. World War II and HYDRA HYDRA and the Red Skull broke off from the 3rd Reich relatively early in the war and had access to advanced technology reverse-engineered from a number of sources, namely the Cosmic Cube and crashed Vehicon scout drones. Around 1940, SSI liberated Abraham Erskine from a HYDRA facility along with his super-soldier serum. The first Allied test subject was a British soldier named James Montgomery Falsworth, who later assumed the moniker "Union Jack". Two years later, Erskine used the serum on the American soldier Steve Rogers, who took up the moniker "Captain America". Over the next two years, Captain America, Union Jack, the Howling Commandos, and Captain Joseph Colton's "Adventure Team" waged a campaign against HYDRA in Europe, culminating in a HYDRA stealth bomber crashing into Greenland and Captain America being assumed KIA. Around the same time, Howling Commandos member James Buchanan Barnes- assumed KIA after falling off a train in Italy- was recovered by the Soviets and was converted into the Winter Soldier. In the Pacific Theatre of the war, Isaiah Bradley (the last recipient of the Erskine Process) fought as "Old Glory". The Cold War The Cold War was overall a lot like it was in our timeline, but with a few added wrinkles. It was during this time that the first iteration of the X-Men was established as a covert ops unit by the CIA, and included Charles Xavier, Max Eisenhardt, Raven Darkholme, "Azazel", and Janos Quested. The unit lasted from 1962 to 1965, when Azazel and Quested turned traitor and defected to the Soviets. The aftermath had Xavier being paralyzed, Eisenhardt and Darkholme disappearing, and Azazel and Quested being executed. After this incident, SHIELD stepped up to handle superhuman assets for NATO, and Hank Pym and Janet van Dyne assumed the mantles of Ant-Man and the Wasp respectively in the late '60s after Pym discovered his namesake particles. The early '70s saw Weapon X turn James Logan Howlett into Wolverine before the project folded after running out of money, along with the establishment of the first proper GI Joe team to combat a revitalized HYDRA. Elsewhere, Eisenhardt and Darkholme established the Brotherhood of Mutants. The biggest point of divergence was in 1961, when the Autobots and Decepticons crashed on Earth. The transwarp wake from their ships dragged in a space capsule containing Reed Richards, Susan Storm, Ben Grimm, and Jonathan Storm. Said capsule reappeared approximately 50 years later, with the inhabitants having been significantly altered. On the Warsaw Pact side of the equation, the Soviets established the Oktober Guard and the Black Widow Program. Of the two, the Oktober Guard lasted longer, and is still in existence in the present day. The 1980s and 1990s In 1982, Trakker Industries employee Miles Mayford went rogue and started the terrorist organization VENOM, stealing prototype transforming vehicles based around technology reverse-engineered from crashed Vehicon scout drones, killing both the company's co-founder Andrew Trakker and GI Joe member Nathaniel "Cable" Summers, and assuming the moniker "Miles Mayhem". In the aftermath, Andrew's older brother Matt Trakker assembled a team which he dubbed "MASK", which took its name from the helmet-like (and superpower-granting) masks that its members wore. Around the same time, Charles Xavier established the Xavier Institute for Gifted Youngsters and the second iteration of the X-Men. Its members included Joanna “Frenzy” Cargill, Xi'an Coy “Karma” Manh, Ororo “Storm” Munroe, Henry “Beast” McCoy, Kevin “Morph” Sydney, and Calvin “Mimic” Rankin, with James Howlett joining the team in 1985 under the moniker "Wolverine". The 1980s in general saw a colossal uptick in supervillain activity, as the closing days of the Cold War put many "mad scientists" in both the US and Soviet Union out of a job. As a result, SHIELD, the X-Men, and MASK saved the world on more occasions than they liked to admit. This came to a close in the early 1990s, when VENOM's second-in-command Vanessa Warfield defected from the organization and struck a deal with SHIELD and MASK. By 1993, most of the supervillains and VENOM agents were either dead or in prison. Shortly thereafter, MASK and the X-Men both dissolved and many of their members went their separate ways. In December 1994, the world was turned on its head practically overnight with a sudden large-scale "awakening" of magic and mutant powers. In the wake of the ensuing chaos, most normal people became suspicious of the newly-empowered superhumans at best. The Present Day The current state of affairs in Earth-H is one of looming apprehension, thanks in no small part to threats such as the Inhumanoids, Decepticons, COBRA, and a new crop of supervillains. Fortunately, things are looking brighter thanks to the presence of various heroes: the Avengers, the third and latest incarnation of the X-Men, the second iteration of GI Joe, Earth Corps, the Autobots, and others.Category:Realities Category:Earth-H